Jokers Wild #1, Jokers Wild is a new Casino in Las Vegas it's owned by three friends who have been by each other's side since they were kids and they have in their each way made it big. Casey the gambler, Nicholas the magician, and Darien the dare devil; all three of them invested their money together to create a new experience for those coming to Vegas. Talia has spent the last seven years of her life cleaning up her father's mess, an inept gambler, if it wasn't for Talia her grandmother would have lost the house to a loan shark because he used it as collateral. Talia has sworn off gamblers she's concentrating on her job and taking care of her Gran.

Talia has the opportunity to get a really good job managing the social media for the new Jokers Wild casino if she gets this no more working two jobs. Casey isn't looking for anything more than a good time but a chance encounter with a woman not once but three times in one day has him thinking differently. One wild and hot night was all it was supposed to be until the next day when they realize Casey is Talia's new boss.

Talia and Casey's sexual attraction is very strong the chemistry is there, but Talia focus so much on the fact that Casey is a gambler and that is basically the epitome of everything she hates that as the reader I had a hard time seeing anything else in the way of Casey's redeeming qualities besides the sexual attraction. Whereas Casey loved everything about Talia you could tell even when she was being obstinate he still loved her and he was trying very hard to get her to see a future for them. Told in the third person POV you get a omniscient view of both sides of their story.

Overall, it was a very smokin' hot story. I enjoyed the characters and their story and I look forward to Nick and Darien's books.

Longhorn Canyon #3, Yay this isn't the last one! Longhorn Canyon Ranch is a working ranch that in the summer takes on some city kids on the verge of being troublemakers and teaches them about ranching and other stuff. We've already seen the oldest of the Maguire brother's find true love and their best friend/foreman find true love, Justin wasn't looking he didn't even think he was ready to settle down but the moment he set eyes on Emily Baker everything changed.

Emily is the events coordinator at a retirement community and one group she deals with heard about the Longhorn Canyon Ranch and their work with kids and asked Emily if she could arrange a special trip for them to the ranch. By all appearances Emily is a city girl but there is more to her than meets the eye. The attraction between them is instant but Emily is determined not to fall for a cowboy. Justin has never felt this way about anyone and he's determined to show Emily he means it. Aside from Emily's family that she hasn't told him about another obstacle is Justin's mother who took an instant dislike toward Emily automatically assuming she's a golddigger.

Overall, this was another really good read from Carolyn Brown. I loved Emily and Justin and all the hyjinks that the Fab Five get into are hysterical. Even though Justin's mom kind of plays the part of the bad guy in this book Emily really is her own worst enemy. The Bonus Book Second Chance Cowboy by A.J. Pine is a book I have previously read it's the first book of the of Crossroads Ranch series and is really good. So as a two for one deal this one is really good one both books are entertaining and fantastic reads.

While not one of my favorite Emma Scott books, it still is one that I thoroughly enjoyed. She has a way of making a story come to life with purpose, and her characters are always so genuine. The supernatural elements of this were portrayed with that same genuineness, making them feel possible in real life.

I probably should have read this over listening, though, because sadly, the narration just didn't do it for me. Joe Arden didn't feel like the right fit for the Nikolaus...I think he made him sound older than he was supposed to be. For Fiona, I believe Caitlin Kelley was the right fit, I just didn't like her male voices, way too gruff and fake-ish. This is why I can't stress enough the importance of picking the right narrators for a story, and making sure they not only pronounce the names and places right but also give the characters the right modulation in the way you envisioned them to be.

Eh. I am pretty much reading anything that costs me zero dollars, so I thought I try one of the Amazon Original Stories. I have read Taylor Jenkins Reid before so I thought this be at least a good read, even though it's a short story. I liked the idea of writing letters back and forth, but though two of the characters were beyond boring, and hated the last letter that was sent. It pretty much makes one of the characters totally crap and actually being someone that she would have despised earlier.

For this short story to make any sense, I will say up front this takes place in the late 1970s. Even though I know that phones exist, let's pretend that two strangers would mail each other and the mail would be able to get to the other person super fast. It drove me nuts sometimes one of them would mention getting together on a certain date and I would like at the date on the letter and wonder how they got it so soon in order to meet.

Reid follows two characters, Carrie and David whose spouses are having an affair. Carrie, because she wants to spread misery (yeah I said it, fight me) writes David a letter and tells him that his wife is sleeping with her husband. I swear this reminds me of a movie that I saw and loathed, with Harrison Ford called Random Hearts. Anyway, Carrie doesn't get a response for several months and writes again and then eventually David starts writing her back.

The entire book is two people wondering what they did wrong (understandable) and putting themselves down and then meeting up eventually and pretty much gushing about the other one (that got old fast). And neither one of them do anything proactive about the cheating spouses. Instead we get to read the letters Carrie steals and sends back to David to read. If anything I was more interested in the cheating spouses. They actually had a personality.

Dancing, loud music, drinking and sex… Who wouldn’t love a job that entailed all these things?After giving up on school and being cast aside by an unsupportive family, Soren Matheson figured he’d landed every young man’s dream job.But… there is a catch. Not everything is as it seems and at the end of the day… Maybe even dream jobs don’t exist.

Remy Moretti lives in a world of precision and order. When a chance run-in with a sassy, sarcastic blond one evening upsets his structured world, Remy needs to find out who he is.What he discovers makes his hair stand on end. The defeat and fear hidden behind the young man’s eyes gives him nightmares.Someone needs to get to the bottom of this.Until then, Remy will need to do whatever it takes to keep Soren safe.

TRIGGER: Sex-trafficking, abuse (off-page)

Review

This romance is very dark at the start and then slowly the light comes in.

Soren lives is snarky denial of how hard his life really is. As Remy shows him love.

There is a lot of grit and sadness here as we see more and more of Soren's life. I am not always sure he is going to make it out but he does.

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